


Healing the Darkness Inside

by Malind



Category: The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild
Genre: Angst, Friendship/Love, M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-05-18
Updated: 2017-05-21
Packaged: 2018-11-02 05:37:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 1,814
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10938087
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Malind/pseuds/Malind
Summary: Link returns to Zora's Domain to seek the aid of Mipha's spirit, but instead finds someone who is just as willing to help.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> The rating is subject to change.

A shade in the dim light, the large Zora stood in front of Mipha’s statue, staring at it solemnly, doing nothing else but whispering quietly as if he was praying. Perhaps he was. It was the exact place Link had seen Prince Sidon weeks before.

To pray for Mipha’s return for 100 years, only to pray for her soul for how many more years…

Seeing him there, Link swallowed his heartache for who Sidon had lost, for someone Link himself barely remembered losing despite trying to. Then, gritting his teeth at the purely physical pain that had been flooding this body for over an hour, sapping any remaining strength, Link took a step away, to give the Zora his privacy but stopped when Sidon suddenly turned his head and caught sight of the relatively small Hylian before he turned around fully.

A smile bloomed on the prince’s face, but it was smaller than any other before it, at least by the Prince’s standards. “Forgive me. You’ve caught me in a moment of weakness.”

Link offered a small smile and nod in return and made again to retreat to give the Zora his solitude. But Sidon stepped forward, stopping him again.

Suddenly frowning slightly, the large creature’s head tilted to the side as he considered him. “Why have you returned to us, Champion? Do you seek council from my father?”

Link’s mouth opened as his head tilted back as Sidon approached. The Zora seemed to have some mercy on him when he stopped again still some distance away. But Link couldn’t bring himself to speak of his troubles. This wasn’t the person he’d been looking for. But then again, Sidon might have known where to find her.

Pain made him pant out, “Your sister, she gifted me her Grace.”

Frown deepening, yellow eyes gave Link a quick but thorough look over before they stopped on blood staining the shredded cloth at stomach. Those eyes went wide and the Zora rushed forward, grabbing Link’s shoulder, placing his other large hand over the Hylian’s stomach. Link tensed, sucking in a breath at the pressure that put spots into his vision and dizziness through his head.

“You must speak when you require aid, my friend! Your silence can do nothing for you.” His grip at Link’s shoulder pressed and forced the man to sit on step behind him that lined the room. Sidon lifted the hand at Link’s stomach, pushing at the cloth to reveal with deep wounds in his flesh, and gasped before whispering, “How ever do you survive on your own?”

The question brought a weak smile to him. Just as quietly, Link replied in his growing delirium as toxins leaked through his body, “I have my ways.”

“Well, those ways have failed you today."

Link couldn’t deny that and that was why he’d come here with the hopes of finding Mipha's spirit, to seek her aid.

A large hand touched his forehead.

“How did I not see your condition immediately?”

The hand trailed down his cheek, cupping the whole side of his face. Link was in no shape to stop it. He’d barely even made it here, after all. Clear blue eyes closed.

“The dark hid your paleness.”

The darkness was doing a lot more than that. It met Link head on and took him to a place he didn’t have the ability to save himself from at that moment.


	2. Chapter 2

When the Hylian went limp in the Zora Prince’s arms, Sidon gasped, the blood-scent covering Link’s body becoming almost overwhelming. Link slumped into Sidon’s arm against his chest and kneeling leg, forcing the prince thrust his own hand behind Link’s neck, gripping the small, almost delicate part all of Link’s kind had, just to keep the human upright. It took a second for the prince to realize what had just happened, to widen his eyes.

But, no, this was impossible. After what he’d seen this human do, there was no way a few slices across Link’s gut could possibly kill him. Granted, they were deep gashes, but merely gashes nonetheless. Just how long had Link had them before he’d more or less stumbled into Sidon’s solitude that was never really solitude with the servants and guards at his feet?

“Champion! You must keep...” He trailed off when he realized his panicked, near shout fell on deaf ears. He carefully laid down Link’s limp body and shouted at the guard who had stepped near, “Get a healer!”

The guard was off in an instant as if running away from the fear in her prince’s voice. It was rare for him to express such an emotion to another in the course of 100 years. Especially with such venomousness. Had their positions been reversed, he would have run like that too, and he was so glad she did.

Sidon lifted his hand he hand pressed against Link's belly. He realized that the human’s clothing was just cloth with no armor to speak of. Link didn’t even have a sword or shield on his back. He seemed so naked without them. A Zora’s skin was thick, almost a shield in itself, but Sidon knew a human’s skin was a delicate thing, able to bleed at even the lightest of scratches. The fact that this human had saved them all when Sidon couldn’t even draw near to their enemy…

Gritting his teeth, so grateful for the human but angered at his own inadequacies, including the inability to call his sister to Link’s aid, he lifted at Link’s blue tunic, revealing the gashes. He had no idea how deep they went, not with the congealed and fresh blood staining his flesh.

No, he couldn’t call upon the one Link truly wanted, but he knew he could try to provide something similar to what Mipha could. He’d healed wounds before with a thought, though only small ones, just like his sister had been able to. But it was an ability he hid from others. As with many other of his abilities, this one was severely lacking as well. He only wondered when the kingdom would come to realize this, his inadequacies. But, until then, he would keep his smile on and try, so hard, to be what his people needed, what they deserved.

Yellow eyes closing, he nurtured that small light that was always inside of himself and drew it to his fingertips. When he felt it release, his breaths heavy, he opened his eyes and watched the wound. The light seemed to do nothing but illuminate exactly how badly Link was wounded, bringing frustrated tears to Sidon’s eyes. He didn’t know how long he knelt there, trying to heal the human he cared so much for, an affection that had only grown over the weeks since Link had left as their Champion. Sidon barely felt the gentle press at his upper arm that urged him away.

The small Zora smiled at him and murmured with her cracking voice, “I will care for him, My Prince.”

He tried to smile back at her, but was sure it more resembled a cringe. He stood back up, towering over them both and watched the elderly female Zora get to work on a human who, a few weeks ago, she might have very well turned her head from. And, for her probable change of heart, he was grateful as well.

“Thank you,” he whispered back, but she didn’t seem to hear him, so lost in her concentration and the light that lit up the night.


	3. Chapter 3

The softness underneath him... That was something Link hadn’t felt for… He couldn’t even remember the last time he’d slept someplace besides the hard ground or high up in the protection of an equally hard tree. He also couldn’t remember it ever being quite this hard to wake up. Well, except when he’d woken up and had soon come to realize he’s lost 100 years of his life but hadn’t aged a day, making him wonder if he’d ever age again.

Soon, the Hylian came to realize the heat of his skin and the cold wetness surrounding him, especially when he shifted on the sheets, sweeping a chill through him. A hand rest on his forehead. Breath that seemed cooler than his skin caressed over his cheek.

“Be still, Champion. Your fever has yet to die down.”

Link knew that voice. It made him open his eyes and watch Sidon’s face suddenly withdraw. The hand left his forehead. A moment later, a huge hand was lifting him by the back of his neck. Something cool, hard pressed at his lips.

“Drink.”

The cool liquid that rushed to the back of Link’s throat made him cough, but Sidon was patient and kept at his task until Link had managed to swallow a few times. It tasted like bitter tea, making him grimace.

“She distilled herbs into it. It’s for the poison,” the prince murmured, “She told me to make sure you drink your fill, but to not give you any food until your fever breaks.”

Link frowned at the smiling Zora, although even that pained Link and aggravated the pounding in his head. “Mipha?”

“No,” the prince breathed but saying nothing more about his sister. Instead, he continued with, “Link… What happened to you? You...”

Through the words, the Hylian watched the Sidon through heavily lidded eyes that only threatened to close again. Even in his nearly unconscious state though, he was… startled that this Zora seemed to carry so much worry for him. And, confusing Link all the more was the fact that the prince of the Zoras was seemingly caring for him when he could have just as well let him dead or left him in the hands of a servant.  For royalty to care about someone who was more a vagabond than the champion Sidon insisted on calling him...

And with the last few words, any hint of a smile was lost on the Zora’s face and he seemed…

Watching Sidon and those expressive yellow eyes, Link suddenly remembered Sidon… crying when he and Mipha had left him behind, Mipha saying he was too young to follow after, that there were responsibilities Sidon had to fulfill, just has she had ones of her own that called relentlessly to her.

Yanking him out of the thoughts, Sidon blurted out, “You must fight this, my friend. And I shall never allow death to touch you while I breathe. If only I...”

The confusing, fervent words made breathing difficult as the pit of Link’s stomach tightened up. The Zora smiled again, as was his way, but there was still an underlining tension in it. Link closed his heavy eyes, unable to help it. And, with it, sleep overcame him again, drawing him back into nightmares of fighting over and over again until teeth gnawed at his flesh over and over again.


End file.
